Chapter 4 #3
And just like that, it’s decided. The next couple steps up. The line moves again. I’m still staring at Aleksi like he’s grown another head.
“Married?” I gasp. “Are you crazy? Why would you lie about that?”
He leans closer, voice low so only I can hear it. “Because I can see it on your face that you’re about thirty seconds from a panic attack.”
“I am not—” I stop, realizing how loud I sound. The CDC agent glances over. I drop my voice again. “You can’t just… lie to federal health officials.”
His shrug is infuriatingly calm. “Would you rather be locked alone in a strange room all night wondering if you caught something? You hate flying, Doc. I’m guessing quarantining a small motel room by yourself is going to be worse.”
I open my mouth to argue, but the words don’t come. Because he’s not wrong. My hands are shaking, my body running on leftover adrenaline that now, without a patient to look after, is turning into fear. Being alone right now sounds like the worst idea imaginable.
“Besides,” he says, lips twitching at the corner, “we’re technically married. For CDC purposes only. Limited-time offer. No vows. No witnesses.”
“This isn’t funny.”
“Didn’t say it was.” His voice drops, serious now. “But I’m not letting you spend the night thinking about everything that could go wrong. If something happens, you won’t face it alone.”
My throat goes tight again for a completely different reason.
The line moves forward. We’re handed a room key packet by another suited agent, the laminate fogging with disinfectant. ROOM 214 scrawled across the front in Sharpie.
“Next,” someone calls behind us.
Aleksi squeezes my elbow lightly, steering me toward the waiting shuttle. “See? Married couples board together,” he says. It’s sarcastic but also has a tinge of enjoyment in it.
I huff out a breath that might almost be a laugh if it didn’t sound so tired.
I should be furious. I should be mortified. But under all of that, buried deep where even I don’t want to look, is relief.
Because he’s right—I don’t want to be alone.
And even if the world outside is unraveling, for the next few hours, I won’t have to be.
“If we’re married,” I mutter, lifting my bare hand and wiggling my ring finger, “where’s my ring?”
I’m standing behind the next person, Aleksi, at my back as we shuffle toward the shuttle steps.
“You want a ring? No problem.”
I glance over my shoulder, not realizing he’s taking that as a challenge, until I see him elbow-deep in his duffel bag.
“I was kidding,” I say, just as the shuttle driver—also suited head to toe in a hazmat suit—barks at me to move it along. Apparently I’m holding up the line. “Sorry,” I mutter sheepishly.
If he only knew that the hockey player behind me is currently making a fake wedding ring in the middle of a CDC quarantine line, just to sell a ridiculous lie he told for me so that I wouldn’t be alone tonight, maybe he’d understand why I look like a deer in headlights.
I climb the three narrow steps into the shuttle, still reeling.
Aleksi follows right behind, still busy crafting whatever makeshift ring he’s conjuring from the depths of his hockey duffel.
Like this is summer camp and he’s making me a friendship bracelet, instead of a CDC quarantine nightmare, like we’re not possibly infected, and he’s about to fix it all with a strip of athletic tape around my ring finger.
And God help me, a tiny, unwanted part of me is glad he’s coming with me.
The shuttle pulls off the main highway somewhere between the middle of nowhere and should’ve stayed in Denver.
The desert stretches out in every direction, endless shrubs and red dust that glows under the floodlights.
The motel squats at the edge of the lot—two stories, painted the color of tired toast, and an empty swimming pool surrounded by a crooked “TEMPORARILY CLOSED” sign.
When we unload, the air is dry enough to scrape my throat. People fan out toward the lobby, CDC agents shepherding groups with the precision of a fire drill. My mind is running through every protocol I can remember from medical crisis training. None of it helps.
Aleksi’s duffel hits the asphalt beside me with a heavy thud. “Five-star accommodations,” he mutters.
I shoot him a look that’s half exhaustion, half disbelief. “You lied to the government for this.”
“Technically,” he says, adjusting his mask with a crooked smile, “I lied for you.”
Inside, the lobby smells like lemon cleaner and despair. The linoleum curls at the corners. A tired clerk in a matching hazmat suit checks IDs while a CDC agent oversees the process. Aleksi hands over our room key packet like he’s proud of it.
“You sure this is a good idea?” I whisper.
“Best bad idea I’ve had all week,” he says.
The clerk hands us two paper bags labeled DINNER – DO NOT REHEAT and a pair of single-use thermometers. Then we’re directed down a hallway lined with faded carpet and flickering lights, like a set from a low-budget apocalypse movie.
Our room smells faintly of an air-conditioner that’s been running too long and stale cigarette smoke that’s older than I am, masked by the smell of bleach.
Two queen beds, one flickering lamp, a TV bolted to the wall.
There’s a packet of disinfectant wipes on the dresser and a sealed bag of disposable toothbrushes.
“This is cozy,” I say dryly.
Aleksi grins behind his mask. “I’ve stayed in worse road hotels when I played overseas.”
“Not during a potential viral outbreak.”
“Details.”
I toss my medical bag on the far bed, peel off my gloves, and scrub my hands until the sink water runs hot. When I finally look up, I freeze.
There’s something around my ring finger.
A thin strip of white athletic tape. The edge is torn clean, wrapped neatly in two turns. There’s a delicate design inked onto the center, perfectly stretched and geometric, the kind of precise linework that makes me blink twice. It’s… beautiful.
Aleksi can draw.
Yet another unexpected talent I never knew about him.
For a moment, I just stare at it. The tape gleams pale against my skin, like it actually belongs there.
I didn’t even feel him do it. Somewhere between the bus and the walk here, he must’ve slipped it on. It’s so perfectly him—equal parts ridiculous and thoughtful. The smallest gesture that somehow manages to crack something open inside my chest.
When I step back out, he’s sitting on the edge of his bed, forearms braced on his knees, still in his team sweats. His eyes flick immediately to my hand.
“Not bad, right?” he says, like he’s asking about a stick-tape job instead of a fake wedding ring.
“You made me a ring out of hockey tape.”
He shrugs. “Technically, it’s athletic tape. High-end. Breathable.”
“And the design?” I ask, glancing back down at it.
“Old Finnish folk art,” he says easily. “There’s a carving just like it in downtown Helsinki. Thought it’d look good on you.”
My lips twitch before I can stop them. “It’s beautiful.”
“Then it matches its new owner,” he murmurs quietly, almost as if just to himself. But I hear it.
I clear my throat, scrambling for a deflection. “And where’s yours?”
He casually holds up his left hand. A matching ring. He used the same tape, creating a thicker band, but the same precise pattern.
The air leaves the room for a second. I never thought he’d make one for himself. I was teasing to cut through the tension, not expecting this. But seeing it… fake or not, it’s a symbol. A marker that says he belongs to me.
“You’re insane,” I say finally, because it’s the only thing that keeps me from saying something far more dangerous.
Maybe it’s the infection scare, or the fear we might not make it home. Maybe it’s exhaustion. But somehow, Aleksi’s over here drawing Finnish folk art rings and making sure I’m not alone.
“Maybe,” he says, eyes crinkling. “But now it’s official. Married couples need proof.”
I cross my arms, but the smile sneaks through anyway. “This is absurd.”
“Absurd works for me,” he says simply.
It’s infuriating, the way he says it like a fact instead of a flirt. Like he knows I need the distraction.
I sit on the far bed, exhausted to the bone. “You realize I could be contagious, right? You shouldn’t be in this room with me. I touched that passenger.”
He leans back on his hands, completely unfazed. “If you are, then I am too. We were on the same plane. You treated him. I carried your bag. Too late to worry now.”
“Aleksi—”
“No.” His tone softens, but it’s firm. “You’re not doing this alone. We make it out of this together, or neither of us do.”
I blink, caught somewhere between wanting to strangle him and wanting to cry.
He meets my eyes, quiet and steady. “Doesn’t matter what it is. I don’t walk away when things get bad.”
And that—God help me—does something to me.
I look away, staring down at my hand again. The strip of tape gleams pale under the overhead light, and though I shouldn’t encourage this, it’s the only thing solid in all this chaos.
“Fine,” I mutter, because fighting him takes too much energy. “But if I start showing symptoms, I’m calling the CDC myself to get you pulled out as soon as possible.”
He grins. “So romantic. You’d kick your husband out of our honeymoon suite on our first night of wedded bliss?”
“You’re not my husband.”
He shrugs one shoulder. “Tell that to the rings.”
I press my palms to my face, groaning. “You’re impossible.”
“Yeah,” he says, voice low now, that soft, teasing rumble that sneaks under my defenses. “But you’re smiling again.”
I lower my hands and glare at him–He’s right. The corner of my mouth has betrayed me.
He picks up one of the paper dinner bags. “You hungry?”
I shake my head, though my stomach growls anyway.
He grins wider. “I’m going to need something more than this to eat tonight since we skipped team dinner to get to the airport. I’m starving.”
“Where are you going?” I ask as he stands.
“I saw a vending machine by the lobby. I’ll get us some drinks and snacks for tonight.”